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Queen of the Grave
Seemingly recorded as "Anonymous Sister" she was exhumed in 1807 as the last two members of her family were dying of Tuberculosis. Her parents had had 14 children and the disease raged through the family until only two were left, her mother and her brother. Out of sheer desperation the mother agreed to have the daughter exhumed and examined for signs of vampirism. Particularly striking about this case is that it is the only known instance were the body was left intact in the United States, only turned around to face the ground. Still, going off the newspaper reports, the moment was so shocking and upsetting that both the surviving brother and mother had sunk into depression and died. One witness was also overcome, in a slightly twisted manor, declaring her to be the Queen of the Dead and writing a flowery poem about her beauty and and seemingly defiance of death. Currently the best source of information for this case is Bell, Michael E., his book Food for the Dead and his blog http://apps.vampiresgrasp.com. Clipping One A Person Who Died of Consumption * Date: Old Colony Memorial and Plymouth Count Advertiser; May 4th 1822 p. 4 * Source and Citations: Strange Superstition, Food for the Dead In that almost insulated part of the State of Massachusetts, called Old Colony or Plymouth County, and particularly in a small village adjoining the shire town, there may be found the relicks {relics} of many old customs and superstitions which would be amusing, at least to the antiquary. Among others of the less serious cast, there was fifteen years ago, one which, on account of it's peculiarity and its consequence, I beg leave mention. It is well known to those who are acquainted with the section of our country, that nearly one half of it's inhabitants die of consumption, occasioned by the chilly humidity of their atmosphere, and the long prevalence of easterly winds. The inhabitants of the village - or town as it is there called - to which I allude were peculiarly exposed to this scourge; and I have seen, at one time, one of every fifty of its inhabitants gliding down to the grave with all the certainty which characterises this insiduous {insidious} foe of the human family. There was, fifteen years ago, and is perhaps at this time, an opinion prevalent among the inhabitants of this town, that the body of a person who died of a consumption was by some supernatural means, nourished in the grave of some one living member of the family; and that during the life of this person, the body remained {retained?} in the grave, all the fullness of freshness of life and health. This belief was strengthened by the circumstances, that the whole families frequently fell a prey to this terrible disease. Of one large family in this town consisting of fourteen children, and their venerable parents, the mother and the youngest son only remained -- the rest within a year of each other had died of the consumption. Within two months from the death of the thirteenth child, an amiable girl of about 16 years of age, the bloon, which characterised the while of this family, was seen to fade from the cheek of the last support of the heart smitten mother, and his broad flat chest was occasionally convulsed by that power deep cough which attends the consumption in out Atlantick {Atlantic} States. At this time as if yo snatch one of this family from an early grave, it was resolved by a few of the inhabitants of the village to test the truth of this tradition which I have mentioned, and, which the circumstances of this afflicted family seemed to confirm. I should have added that it was believed that if the body thus supernaturally nourished in the grave, should be raised and turned over in the coffin, its depredation upon the survivor would necessarily cease. The consent of the mother being obtained, it was agreed that four persons, attended by the surviving and complaining brother should, at sunrise the next day dig up the remains of the last buried sister. At the appointed hour they attended in the burying yard, and having with much exertion removed the earth, they raised the coffin upon the ground; then, displacing the flat lid, they lifted the covering from her face, and discovered what they had indeed anticipated, but dredded to declare - yes i saw the visage of one who had been long the tenant of a silent grave, lit up with the brilliance of youthful health. The cheek was full to dimpling, and a rich profusion of hair shaded her cold forehead, and while some of its richest curls floated upon her unconscious breast. The large blue eyes had scarcely lost its brilliancy, and the livid fullness of her lips seemed almost to say, "loose me and let me go." In two weeks the brother, shocked with the spectacle he had witnessed, sunk under his disease. The mother survived scarcely a year, and the long range of sixteen graves is pointed out to the stranger as an evidence of the Truth of the Belief of the inhabitants. The following lines were written on a recollection of the above shocking scene: I saw her, the grave sheet was round her, months had passed since they had laid her in clay; yet the damps of the tome could not wound her, the worms had not seized on the prey. O, fair was her cheek, as I knew it. When the rose all its colours there brough; and that eye, did a tear then bedew it? Gleame'd like the herald of thought. She bloom'd, though the shroud was around her, locks o'er her cold bosom wave, as if the stern monarch had crown'd her, the fair speechless queen of the grave. But what ends the grave such lustre? O'er her cheeks what such beauty had shed? His life blood, who bent there, had nurs'd her, the living was food for dead! Clipping Two Letter to the Editor 1822 * Date: Old Colony Memorial and Plymouth Count Advertiser May 11th 1822 p. 7 * Source and Citations: Old Colony Memorial May 11th 1822, Food for the Dead Sir-- the writer indulges his imagination in ranting about the superstitious customs which specially prevail in the Old Colony, or Plymouth County, and this he fantastically locates in an insulated part of the State of Massachusetts. His first assertion is too extravagant to require refutation. If true it would imply a phenomenon which has ever occured in any part of eh habitable world, "that nearly one half of the people die of consumption" nor will it be credited, that one of fifty of the inhabitants fall prey to this inexorable disease. It is impossible to conceive the motive by which the writer could be actuated in advancing a position so glaringly preposterous the average proportion of the consumptive cases is about one to every five and a half deaths. This estimate applies to New England and the intermediate Sates, extending to the Carolinas. Instances, it must be conceded, too frequently occur of whole families having a constitutional predisposition to consumption, by which parents are bereft of children in the early periods of life. But the writer in the Philadelphia Union, cites one instance of a family in this vicinity consisting of sixteen persons, all of whom were victims of consumption. The number specified, as well as fanciful ideas relative to the superstitious belief in the salutary effects to be derived from touching the entombed corpse, bear evident marks of great exaggeration. During a residence of nearly forty years in the district referred to, and favoured with opportunities of correct observation respecting this subject, the writer of this reply has not been made acquainted, with but one solitary instance of raising the body of the dead for the benefit of the living: and this was done purely in compliance with the caprice of a surviving sister, reduced to the last stage of hectic debility and despair. Although the family and connections entertained not the smallest hope of beneficial consequences, they could not in duty and tenderness refuse to indulge a feeble minded and debilitated young woman ina mean, on which she had confided her last fallacious hope. Inferences must be extreamly incorrect when drawn from solitary instances, and it may with truth be affirmed, that the inhabitants of Plymouth County are equally intelligent, and not more remarkable addicted to superstition than the generality of our race. The Poem * Old Colony Memorial and Plymouth Count Advertiser; May 4th 1822 p. 4 I saw her, the grave sheet was round her, months had passed since they had laid her in clay; yet the damps of the tome could not wound her, the worms had not seized on the prey. O, fair was her cheek, as I knew it. When the rose all its colours there brough; and that eye, did a tear then bedew it? Gleame'd like the herald of thought. She bloom'd, though the shroud was around her, locks o'er her cold bosom wave, as if the stern monarch had crown'd her, the fair speechless queen of the grave. But what ends the grave such lustre? O'er her cheeks what such beauty had shed? His life blood, who bent there, had nurs'd her, the living was food for dead! Sources * Old Colony Memorial May 11th 1822 Letter to the Editor Old Colony Memorial & Plymouth County Advertiser, 11 May 1822, page 7, newspaper Plymouth Massachusetts Chronicling America, US Library of Congress * Food for the Dead On the Trail of New England’s Vampires Middleton, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2011 Paperback Edition, pp 269-275, 305 * Strange Superstition Superstitions of New England Old Colony Memorial and Plymouth County Advertiser, 4th May 1822 Newspaper, Plymouth, Massachusetts * http://apps.vampiresgrasp.com * Additional Newspaper Clipping: Vermont Journal Vol. 39 Apr 1822 Category:V Category:Plague Vampire Category:Consumptive Dead Category:Queen of the Grave Category:New England Vampires Category:Historic Person